


Crown on the Ground

by thermodynamic (euphoriaspill)



Series: Stigmata [5]
Category: The Outsiders - S. E. Hinton
Genre: Borderline Personality Disorder, Brother-Sister Relationships, Catholicism, Child Abuse, Child Marriage, Dysfunctional Family, F/M, Female Friendship, Gangs, Grandparents & Grandchildren, Mental Health Issues, Miscarriage, Mother-Daughter Relationship, POV Character of Color, Period-Typical Sexism, Slut Shaming, Suicidal Thoughts, Teen Pregnancy, Underage Rape/Non-con, Unrequited Crush
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-07
Updated: 2021-03-06
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:54:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25774693
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/euphoriaspill/pseuds/thermodynamic
Summary: If there's one thing Angela likes, it's getting her own way— no matter what the consequences may be.
Relationships: Angela Shepard/Original Male Character(s), Bryon Douglas/Angela Shepard, Curly Shepard/Original Female Character(s), Ponyboy Curtis/Angela Shepard, Tim Shepard/Original Female Character(s)
Series: Stigmata [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2083080
Comments: 2
Kudos: 16





	1. Criminal

_Jesus died for somebody's sins_

_But not mine_

— Gloria: In Excelsis Deo, Patti Smith

* * *

_September 1966_

"It's not workin' out anymore." I prod Bryon's bare thigh with the ends of my toes, for emphasis. "I want to call it quits."

He gapes at me like a fuckin' fish, right after it gets hooked; I tap at the blankets for my bra, slip it on over my shoulders and do the clasp behind my back. By the time I'm done with that, he still hasn't changed facial expressions, or so much as moved to put his shirt back on. "Wait... what? Why? I thought everything was—"

Well, first of all, because two-pump Bryon isn't nearly good enough in the sack for me to put up with the rest of him— I figured having a boyfriend my own age might be a gas, but the attention and the free booze just ain't fair compensation. He ought to count himself lucky I let him hit it one more time before I cut him loose. "I just think we should see other people," I say with equal vagueness, my mouth dry and cottony from the grass we smoked beforehand. "We got exclusive real quick, I ain't so sure I'm done playin' the field. Besides—" I try to shimmy into my skirt without having to stand up— "my brothers don't like you none."

That's not the most fair criticism in the world, Tim and Curly have never liked any guy I brought home, and wouldn't on principle. I'm dancing around the real reason, and Bryon, he's pretty dense but he's not downright dumb, either. "There's someone else, ain't there? Who the hell is he?"

A car pulls up at the end of the street and I blanch as I wait for the front door to open— if it's Tim, I might as well start digging my own grave and lay myself down in it, right after he gets done disconnecting Bryon's head from his body. Fortunately, I wait one, two, three seconds, and there's no footsteps coming down the hall. "That ain't none of your business, is it?" I say, my tone sliding up past snooty. "Ain't you no more, Bryon, take a hint."

He starts calling me a lot of nasty shit, which I expected. That I'm a slut and a bitch and a tease who strung him along, used him for money and booze, that I ain't any better than my white trash whore mama. I let him get it all out, because in his impotent burst of anger, he's scooted all the way to the edge of my bed. And once he's paused to catch his breath for a second, I jerk my foot out and shove him onto the floor.

"You all done?" I ask with my sweetest smile. He's too shocked to respond immediately, which is when my expression slides straight into contempt. "That's what I thought. Now get the fuck out of my house."

He's still cussing me as he pulls the rest of his clothes back on and slams the door behind him, hard enough he's knocked one of my mama's crucifixes off the wall, but I'm not listening, I never was; I walk over to my vanity and start dragging a brush through my hair, rotate in front of my full-length mirror and look myself up and down. I'm real pretty, my eyes popping from the liner I winged around them this morning, and I slick on a fresh coat of lip gloss to seal the deal. Not to sound conceited or nothing, it's just the honest truth— for a Mexican girl, anyway. Heard that qualifier more often than I like to remember.

It's set me apart from a young age, and not always in a good way, but I swat at the bad thoughts until they vanish into the corners of my mind— I'm not the type to dwell, let myself sink into all my dark like it's the La Brea tar pit. I know how to get what I want with it, that's the important thing about me.

* * *

There's no way on the surface that I should be interested in Ponyboy Curtis, who doesn't have his own car or a street corner or even much of a bad reputation. _Pretty like a girl_ , they call him and his brother Soda, and they don't always say it in such a nice way, either. But lately I've let myself fantasize about having a _boyfriend_ , not some sleazy hood who's fucking me to pass the time between huffs of spray paint. A class ring around my neck and a letterman jacket and a date to the prom, all the things Soc broads just consider their birthright. Sue me. I look at him and I know he'd never put his hands on me, or cheat, or try to wheedle a condom off. He's the kind of guy you bring home to your mama, not the kind you sneak out your bedroom window.

"Hey, Ponyboy," I say shyly, as I walk in through their unlocked door and spot him on the couch— for once, it comes natural to me, my heart's thumping in my chest like a kitten trapped in a suitcase.

"Jasmine ain't home," he says as he flips the page of his book; it's about as much interaction as we've had in the past year, it's a fair thing to say. He spent plenty of time hanging around my house growing up, but I never joined in, he and Curly had a pretty strict 'no girls allowed' policy when they were smoking up in his and Tim's room. "She an' Darry went out grocery shopping."

I toss my hair over one shoulder and sit down next to him; he has real long eyelashes, I notice as he blinks and they fan out on the top of his cheek, all coppery like a spool of wire. "What are you readin'?"

He gives me a funny look— I don't know how authentic that sounded, I've never been much of a reader myself. " _The Catcher in the Rye_ ," he says. His t-shirt is so big he's swimming in it, he must have stolen it from one of his brothers. "It's about this guy Holden Caulfield, he keeps gettin' expelled from all these swanky private schools his parents ship him off to— my old English teacher said I might like it—"

I cut him off before I have to listen to an entire plot summary. "You ever been kissed before?"

He blushes straight from the apples of his cheeks up to the tips of his ears. "No?" He says it just like that, too, a question. Jesus, I never figured he was so innocent, at fifteen— with his status as a regular hometown hero now, the amount of girls who've made eyes at him, I wasn't even sure if he was still a virgin.

I scoot closer to him, until one of my legs is over his thigh and I'm halfway into his lap. "You want to be?"

"Sure?"

We make out for maybe thirty seconds. It's not exactly great; he has no idea where to put his hands and flails around until he settles them somewhere near my waist, close to my backside. I don't think I've ever tasted so much spit before, our teeth clang together and he bites down on my lower lip, hard enough to sting. We pull away and stare at each other after we run out of air; he wipes his mouth off with the back of his hand. "Wow," he says, dazed like he's just been hit over the head with an anvil. "That was... uh, wow."

I swallow down my disappointment— what was I expecting, a kiss straight out of a supermarket romance novel? So he doesn't know what he's doing, it was his first time and all; the thought kind of excites me the more I sit with it, getting to show him the ropes, corrupt him a little. That's why I go to the zipper of his jeans, start yanking it down. "I liked it," I say slowly, looking up at him in a way I hope is meaningful and suggestive. "A lot." Okay, now that's a bit of an exaggeration. "We can do it some more, if you want. Or we don't have to stop at kissin'."

He keeps staring at me, shellshocked, but when I move towards his zipper again, he jerks away from me. "No, what the hell?" I'm stung; now my hands are dangling awkwardly, I have no idea where to put them. "Where d'you suggest we do it, on the couch before Darry gets home?"

I'm not so sure I love his tone, but for some godforsaken reason, I shrug and keep going. "We can always get out of here, no one's home at my place—"

"So Tim can smash my skull in with a baseball bat when he gets back?" His face turns the color of expired yogurt, and when he speaks again, it's with worse than disgust— it's with pity. "Look, goin' from first base to hittin' a home run in one day, that's a little much for me. I barely know you, Angel, sheesh."

"... Right." It's the first time I've ever heard of a guy trying to hit the brakes, and I'm not sure how to respond to it; I pat the top of my head, wonder if I should've done something different with my hair. My hopes of going to prom with him, or even homecoming in the fall, are vanishing right before my eyes. "Sorry."

"Don't be," he says, "I mean... I'm sure a lot of guys, they'd be real happy, but I'm just..." He looks even more uncomfortable than before, if that's humanly possible. "I'm pretty sure I only want to do _that_ when I'm married."

I never got the chance to save anything for marriage; I was still playing with Barbies, back then. Reminds me of my mama, telling me that _good girls wait_ ; I wrinkle my nose. "I mean, you remember what happened with Soda, last year—" I had a lot more going on at the time than worrying about Soda's love life, but yeah, his girl Sandy got knocked up with another man's kid, didn't she? "I just don't think I want that kind of trouble right now. Hell, I've had enough trouble for a lifetime."

"It's all right, you don't have to explain," I say, trying to salvage what's left of my pride. "I'll see you around, yeah? You comin' down to the Ribbon tomorrow night?"

"Maybe," he says vaguely, "Mark said he was fixin' to show me how to hotwire a car." It's a no, he's just too polite to tell me so. "There's some cookies in the stove, if you want one," he adds with another polite, pitying smile. "Jasmine always bakes them before our social worker visits."

He's obviously trying to shoo me the hell out of his house; I grab three cookies on my way out, though. I never turn my nose up at free food. It's not like there's ever anything good to eat at home.

* * *

My mama's waiting for me at the door when I get home, my stepdaddy's belt in one hand, a used condom in the other. Jesus fucking Christ, she been digging through my trash again? She'd be better off dragging a brush through her hair first, or God forbid, taking a shower. I don't remember when she last changed out of that ratty terrycloth bathrobe she's got on.

(Tim thinks he's Ma's least favorite— what a gas. She might rage over him, her _hijo perdido_ , but she never dared push him too far once he got older, afraid he'd run out of the house and take his _mota_ money with him; hell, she's afraid of him period, he's threatened to raise his hand to her often enough. He's useful to her, raised her kids, paid her bills; I'm just some daughter. Just a reminder of everything in her that's gone to seed.)

"Angela Reagan," she comes out swinging with every southern mother's favorite, the first and middle name combo. Raises it up into the light, gingerly pinched between her thumb and index finger like a cigarette. "What exactly is _this_?"

I haven't even had a drop of alcohol I can blame my attitude on. I'm ornery all on my own. "You expect me to believe you don't recognize one of those?"

She drops it and cracks me across the mouth with an agility I didn't realize she had; my teeth cut into my bottom lip, and I taste blood. "What would your father think?"

"I don't have a dad," I say, swish some of the blood around and spit it onto the floor. Realize she's referring to my dead one, who I barely remember, Tim's face is all I can see when I try to picture him. "I don't give a fuck what he'd think about anything."

"How did I end up here?" she asks, her face tilted up at the ceiling, as though she's asking God. "I raised you right, I took y'all to church twice a week, but your brothers are both complete _malandros_ , I'll be going to their funerals soon enough, and you, you're a dirty little _prostituta_ , spreadin' your legs just like those girls who run around with your uncles—"

When English fails her, she turns to Spanish for her insults. There's a lot of easy ways I can respond, to a woman who ran off with a gangbanger when she was seventeen and used to make us call a new man 'uncle' every month, but I just straighten my spine and give her my most winning smile. "There ain't no one like me."

She clutches a handful of my curls, yanks me right towards her, like we're schoolgirls fighting in the halls. "I'm fixin' to straighten your ass out, you see if I don't—"

I'm not exactly afraid of what she can do to me, I've been slapped around a lot worse by grown men, and she's too damn short and slight to do any real damage— I could take her in a fight, easy. But I'm still pretty grateful when Curly comes barreling out of his and Tim's room. "Ma, let go of her, c'mon now," he says, like a zookeeper trying to urge an escaped lion back into its cage. "C'mon now. It's all right."

Her grip slackens a little, which is enough for me to scramble away, though not before I've left half of my hair behind in her fist; I massage my scalp, feel the divots where the roots strained against it. "Did you hear the way she was talkin' to me?" she demands. "Did you hear the way that little _puta_ thinks she can talk to her own mother?"

"I know," he says soothingly, "she shouldn't be talkin' back to you. Why don't you go back to bed, a'ight, and have some more whiskey, yeah? Help you sleep. And I'll set her straight."

It sounds ridiculous on the surface— Curly and I are Irish twins, he's only eleven months older than me, but he and Tim have always been two halves of a surrogate husband to her. Tim brings home the paycheck, Curly rubs her feet and listens to her day. She visibly unclenches, some of the confused rage fading from her eyes. "I need you, honey," she says like she didn't just call him a _malandro_ , plants a sloppy kiss on his cheek— he takes it with good grace. "You're the only person who's ever loved me, I swear."

Curly waits until she's shut her bedroom door again to start bawling me out, pulls me into mine. "Jesus, Angie, you was doin' that in the house?" Like he and Jasmine aren't doing _that_ themselves, in a lot of interesting places. "With Bryon?"

"I just broke up with him. _God._ " I throw my pillow over my face, then flip him off for good measure; I can't see it, but I'm pretty sure he's smirking. "Not that it's none of your business. And you're gonna _set me straight_ now, huh? She ambushed me the second I walked through that door, I never stood a chance."

He pulls the pillow away, and his expression is serious when I look at him again. "She's sick, you know that," he says. "And it ain't like you don't try to push her buttons, you ain't no good at playin' innocent."

"Ain't nothin' wrong with her a detox couldn't cure, and ain't that easy for you to say, when you're the old lady's favorite." Curly and I get along okay because for the most part— unlike Tim— he doesn't spend every waking moment clucking over the length of my skirt and whether I'm drinking something and my grades at school and junk like that. I'm not sure how much I'm enjoying this new side to him.

"It's 'cause I'm the best-lookin'," he says, and I reluctantly crack a grin. He ain't wrong, though _most white_ ought to replace _best_ in that sentence. "Hell, I'm real glad you finally kicked Douglas to the curb, though. He's a whiny little shit and his brother, whatever you wanna call that kid who crashes at his house, his eyes give me the creeps."

"Me too." Mark Jennings, and his golden eyes with nothing behind them, remind me enough of Joe to make my own vision slide right out of focus. "... How would you feel if I went out with Ponyboy?"

"Ponyboy _Curtis_?"

"Yeah, stupid, how many others do we know?"

He picks up the pillow and smacks it into my face; I sputter. "That'd be kind of weird," he says with uncharacteristic thoughtfulness. "I mean, I know he's a good guy, so that's a load off. But he's my friend too, so if he breaks your heart, I'm gonna feel real bad about breakin' his face." He looks at me suspiciously. "Why?"

"No reason," I say with what I hope is a reassuring smile, but I'm already planning my next move, now that he wants to play hard to get. That's another thing about me. I'm always thinking two steps ahead.


	2. Slow Like Honey

"Get your _own_ bowl," I say as I yank my Apple Jacks away from Curly's searching spoon; he gives me an indignant glare like I just stabbed him in the throat. Every time I try to eat breakfast with my family, I remember why I don't do usually do that.

Tim both looks and smells ridiculously hungover, makes a noise like a beached whale when Curly's elbow jabs into him— I'm surprised he made it to the table at all, and hasn't vomited onto it yet. Ed started his third round of court-ordered AA this week, so I guess he considers him a pretty easy target for that repressed irritation. "What the hell are you still doin' here." He slams his fork down, for emphasis, at least he didn't throw a plate. "You're twenty years old. No school, no job, no nada— you're dead weight. Only thing you do is mouth off to your mother and bring your creepy relatives over."

"I'm still nineteen, not that I've ever expected no birthday gift from you," Tim says, "and every day I ask myself the same question." He turns away from him long enough to scowl at me. "Go change, lady, is that supposed to be a blouse or some new kind of brassiere?"

I stick my tongue out at him, real mature like. "Don't tell your sister what to do— you sure got a big mouth, when you're sleepin' across from your brother at your mama's place," Ed says, and the muscles in Tim's jaw clench. Now they're on their favorite fight, one they get into at least twice a week, who's the man of this house. Don't I know there's a man in this house? "You really think you call the shots around here, huh, tough guy?"

"Awh, Dad," Curly cuts in— he only ever calls him that when he's trying to suck up— "I don't mind sharin'." Of course he doesn't, he gets to talk Tim's ear off all night while he's trying to sleep, and had free rein of his dirty magazines before Gabi made him throw them out, too.

"He's a bad influence on you," Ed grunts, and well, he ain't exactly wrong on that front, is the worst part. "Every time your little ass gets locked up, I know who's responsible for it, you worship him like he's some cross between Mickey Mantle and Superman. Your legal fees done cost more than anything he's brought home pushin' product, I swear to God."

Tim gets up and wobbles, like he's trying to find his sea legs, clutches the top of the chair he doesn't bother to push back into the table. Then he walks out and slams the door behind him.

* * *

Operation: pick up a halfway-decent guy, round two, could be best described as a Hail Mary effort. I smooth imaginary wrinkles on my tight blouse, before sauntering over to where Ponyboy's sitting with his friends on the hood of Steve Randle's truck. Two-Bit Mathews elbows him as he lets his eyes catch on my ass, he's never been much of one for subtlety; he finally managed to buckle down long enough to move on to senior year, I guess because administration told him he couldn't stay enrolled past twenty-one. "Awh, who's this, now?" he says with a condescending snicker. "Miss Thing, ain't you grown up since you an' my kid sister was playin' Barbies together."

Yeah, my mama used to drop me off at his house when I was a kid sometimes, and Miss Ellen was good-natured enough to feed me peanut butter sandwiches across the table from her own daughter, since they worked at the same bar. Not that I ever liked drippy little Grace Mathews much. After I popped off Barbie's head and tried to re-enact the Salem Witch trials by melting her body over the stove, Miss Ellen finally had enough of me and dragged me home; maybe I got a whooping, but I also got my wish, no more damn playdates.

"C'mon, quit gawkin' at her before she tells Tim to beat your head in—" That would be Steve Randle. Near all I know about him is that he's Pretty Boy Curtis's best friend and too smart-assed for his own good. "Hey, Angel, your big brother really let you out on the street in that get-up?"

I just roll my eyes and brush off the heckling; it's pretty typical stuff, if you're a greaser girl, I've sure heard a lot worse before. Compared to some of Tim's friends, the Curtis crew is composed of regular Prince Charmings, at least since Dally died. "Tim don't 'let' me do nothin', first of all," I say, and Steve smirks, throws his hands up. It's sure been a long time since he's been able to stop me from doing shit. "Ain't you graduated already, why are you hanging around the high school parking lot? I wanted to talk to Ponyboy for a second. Alone."

Steve lets out a nasty little snort. "Brother, what'd I always tell you about gettin' involved with broads like this?" he demands, nudging Ponyboy on the other side, who's turned an interesting shade of pale green. "Didn't you learn nothin' from all of Soda's mess?"

"It ain't like that!"

"Awh, hell, don't be modest now, you told me all about it," Two-Bit says. "Ponykid, you might be the only red-blooded male at Will Rogers Senior High to have the good sense to resist her— how _do_ you do it?"

"Oh, he's got real high standards, 's why I was so surprised," Steve says with a chortle. "He's been fixin' his eyes on that new girl, Cathy Carlson, got a taste for Socs— or chicks that can pass for them, anyway." Wasn't _Cathy Carlson_ in third grade when I was in second? I never remembered her being much of a looker. "Thinks he's gonna take her to homecoming, if he ever works up the nerve."

"I just wanted to ask him to the drive-in or somethin', see a movie, calm the fuck down," I say as I try to pick up the shattered pieces of my dignity. I ain't doing such a great job. Why the hell isn't Ponyboy saying anything in my defense? "Not make a marriage proposal. He gonna get to speak for himself, or did the court appoint y'all as his guardians now?"

"Listen, doll," Steve says, and it's with a steely undertone as he leans forward, his eyes gleaming like gunmetal. "Pony's too nice to say it direct, he don't want to hurt your feelings, so I'm gonna help him make you take a hint— he ain't interested in buyin' the cow, when the milk's already come free. Why don't you run along back to Bryon now, before he notices you've gone missing."

Ponyboy stifles it with his fist, but he snickers for a second. And just about every spark of a crush extinguishes inside me right then. "Come on, Steve," he adds feebly, goddamn him, making it impossible for me to hate him as much as I want to, "don't be like that, she's Jasmine's friend—"

"Jasmine needs better friends," Steve says, and he's looking right at me. "Git goin', Princess Shepard. He don't want his own paternity scandal or shotgun wedding."

I should have a snappy comeback at the ready— I've verbally sparred with guys a hell of a lot more intimidating than the likes of Steve Randle and come out on top. I don't. I shove the shame deep down inside my stomach, let the acid vulcanize it; my face hot, I just walk away.

* * *

My grandmother's sitting on the couch when I get home, cussing up a storm at the TV; when she finally figures out it's nothing but static unless you want to watch football, the weather, or a service, she cusses even louder and tosses the coffee table copy of Catholic Digest at the set. "Ain't your mama thought about gettin' cable yet, Angela?" she asks me in lieu of a greeting. "It's '66, but I swear that woman's stuck in the Eisenhower administration."

I'm surprised to see her, she runs blackjack tables in Shawnee and pretty much never comes to visit us— 'your ma gives me indigestion I can't afford at my age'— but I take it in stride. An unexpected visitor is about the least interesting thing to happen in this house. "Hell, she wouldn't even let us watch anything that wasn't religious growin' up, good luck with that." Meemaw used to be a flapper, back in the twenties; there's pictures all over her house of her with bobbed hair, dresses cut well above her knee, a cigarette in hand and sometimes her two kids, my mama and my uncle Cillian, in the background like an afterthought. She was also a completely unrepentant bootlegger who did six months in a women's prison for it. From her, I can understand where my mama got her love of drinking, no-good men, and running her mouth. The devout Catholicism is more of a mystery.

"Let me get a good look at you," she demands after she's lit a smoke, right in the middle of the living room. Christ, if Ma ain't about to throw the mother of all fits, once she walks in and sees this— or smells it. I stand in front of her and await her approval or disapproval, not sure of which one she'll land on. "I like your outfit," she says with a wicked smile, "but ach, what's goin' on with that hair?" She leans forward and tugs out a curl, rubs it between her fingers. "You're too small and petite to have that mop hangin' halfway down your back, it weighs down your whole face— and in the kind of heat we get here, too?" She shakes her head. "I'd chop it all off, if I were you. I stuck a bowl over your head when you was three years old, cut off everything that stuck out, you never looked better."

"She'll look fast, Mammy, I won't have it." I didn't even notice Ma stumble in, her already-narrow lips swallowed back into her face. "Believe me, she don't need your help with that."

"Girls choose whether or not they become fast," Meemaw says, tapping ash onto the carpet, "God knows you turned out exactly the way you wanted." Ma's just itching to tell her not to take the Lord's name in vain, but you can't pick those kinds of battles with Meemaw. "Priest say lipstick's a sin now too, Mary? He ain't doin' you no favors, and you ain't even hit forty yet."

Meemaw's entire face is done up like a Vegas showgirl's— false lashes, sparkly pink eyeshadow, blush badly blended into the apples of her cheeks. Ma hasn't been outside in the better part of a week and it shows. "Don't you dare disrespect Father Declan in my house—"

"Father Declan is a goddamned pervert, like every last priest," Meemaw says with relish, sucking on the filter. "Don't you remember the time he tried to get into your little altar boy's pants?"

"Tim made that horseshit up to get out of goin' to church," Ma says between teeth knit together so tight, she's going to grind them to dust. Admittedly, that is around the time Tim declared he was an atheist. I didn't know a 5'3 woman could swing a belt that hard, and Lord, neither did he. "How long are you in town for, Mam?"

"Until further notice," she says, "that sonuvabitch Clyde's been messin' around on me, I can't even be near that town until I get my head back on straight." I think Clyde's my third 'step-granddaddy'. "It ain't that much of a loss, he wasn't much use in the bedroom, anyway. If his flag can't get higher than half-mast, Angel—" She winks at me.

(Curly's Ma's favorite and Tim was our daddy's, but I'm Meemaw's. Took me a while to figure out that has more to do with spiting my mother than anything I've got going for me, but I'm not in the position to look a gift horse in the mouth.)

Ma's face is the color of uncooked liver. "Mam for the love of God and all the angels would you get out of my house already." Mutters under her breath, "lightin' up in here like this is a roadhouse, can't even make a fuckin' phone call first—"

"Let me know when the boys are home," she says, but shuffles off amicably enough. She's said her piece.

"Is that how you'd like to turn out?" Ma demands after the screen door slams shut. Meemaw's pulling out another clove cigarette out from her jacket. "No husband, next to nothin' to do with her kids or grandkids, dressed like some streetwalker even though she's pushin' sixty?"

"Yeah, sounds pretty swell," I say, and dodge the slap she aims at the back of my head.

* * *

"Angel, I need to talk to you 'bout somethin'." Tim's skulking in the doorway when I turn around to look at him; Christ hell, does he ever knock, or does he just think every room in the house is his for the taking? His arms are crossed over his chest, his blunt nails digging into his biceps. "Get your... I mean, I don't need... your _opinion_. I just— shit. I said we need to talk."

"Can it wait?" is my reaction to his verbal diarrhea. My mouth hangs open as I apply mascara with a wand; I let out a muffled cuss as some smears onto the bridge of my nose. I don't have steady hands. "I got somewhere to be tonight." I'm praying he hasn't found out about the Ponyboy situation, he's been buddying up real close to Darry lately, and I wouldn't be surprised if the gossip managed to reach his ears.

"No," he snaps, "it can't." Then he goes back to looking awkward and uncomfortable, shifting from foot to foot like a little kid. "It's important, okay?" He sits down on my bed and pats the portion of mattress next to him. "Can you c'mere for a second?"

My stomach tightens with anxiety, but I do what he says; he cradles his cheek in his hand, then pulls a black velvet box out of his pocket, snaps it open. The rock isn't anything to write home about, but I wouldn't call it embarrassingly small, either. "I'm gonna ask Gabi to marry me, I think."

"You sure about that?"

"Don't be a brat," he says, his eyebrows furrowing into a severe triangle, "yeah, I'm _sure_. I never got your damn problem with her."

Of course he doesn't. Gabi's God's favorite princess, wife material. She knows how to dress and walk and talk right, and breaks up fights by telling boys that _this isn't like them_ , and cleans up after parties without being asked. Tim adores her, so does half the outfit. She's everything I should be, and everything I'm not, and I'd be able to handle that better if she quit trying to act like my mama all the time.

"You can marry her if you want," I say finally. "I can't really stop you or nothin', I guess."

"Thanks for the ringing endorsement, but..." He sighs. "Shit, I don't know how to say this. I wouldn't be movin' her into my twin bed to fight for the shower with us in the morning, you dig? I'd be gettin' us our own place. I have some money saved up—"

... Oh.

Nervously, he keeps on talking. "Look, Ed ain't wrong, okay— I'm a twenty-year-old, grown ass man livin' in my mama's house, sharin' a room with my kid brother. I know I've stuck around to look after y'all, but let's face it, half the time when he starts throwin' things, it's at me anyway. I'm causin' more problems than I solve."

Oh.

"I'll still be sendin' money over, nobody's fixin' to go hungry," he says. "And you can come visit whenever you want, I promise. I won't be so far away, just over on the North side, where tíos live and closer to the business."

I don't want to be mature about this— I want to throw a fit like the _mocosa_ Tim accused me of being, like I might've even a couple years ago. I want to beg him not to leave me alone here. "You already tell Curly about it?" I croak instead.

"Yeah, he's real excited, he's gonna be my best man." Tim looks about as excited as _he_ ever gets, which means he's smiling slightly. "Gabi's gonna ask her sister to be her maid of honor, but maybe she'll want you in the bridal party—"

I'm pretty sure she won't, she has plenty of girlfriends, but she'll offer anyway to look nice. The back of my throat feels like it's being squeezed shut with pliers. Every time Tim's been gone, in juvie or just not bothering to come home for weeks on end, that's when the really bad shit's happened— and now he's fixing to leave for good? Offering up _visits_? Why the hell ain't he offering to take us with him?

But when I open my mouth to protest, nothing comes out. Tim raised me and Curly since we were real little, with our daddy being dead and our mama sick in the head as long as I can remember. When he was my age now, and a lot younger, it was always Tim who kept our whole house running, cooked us meals and stole us Christmas presents and got on our cases when we acted up. Even got his face cut open protecting me, though I still ain't so sure it was worth it. I'm old enough that I need to look after myself now, not just be a useless burden to him, the way Ma is. What's he ever gotten to do for himself, his whole life?

So I put on my best show smile. We never had any money for extracurriculars growing up, but if we did, I should've gone into community theater. "You better take enough outta them savings for me to get a decent dress."

He hugs me then— with both arms, a rarity for us— pulls me into his chest. I never let that smile falter, even when he can't see my face anymore.


End file.
